


Moreaus

by TheStoryBookTree



Category: Furry (Fandom)
Genre: Furry, Multi, Original Character(s), Original Fiction, Science Fiction, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 04:12:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13333251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheStoryBookTree/pseuds/TheStoryBookTree
Summary: Human society in the 2060’s is turned upside down when anthropomorphic animals appear all over the world, dumped by some secret organization. 40 years later, they’ve integrated into human society… mostly.... Kinda. They live mostly segregated with relatively similar treatment, but society has encountered a whole new kind of racism with these people with animal traits. The third generation in the world is being raised into a world that hates and misunderstands them, with only a few bastions of shining equality present in human society.They can speak language normally, interbreed and breed with humans, but possess traits possessed by animals. The corporation that created them is still unknown or how they achieved such a flawless feat of incredible genetic engineering. Governments of the world are offering large money incentives and pardons for tampering with the human genome to come out of hiding and collaborate with them. So far, none has stepped forward.These beings have been nicknamed in politics and overall as ‘Moreaus’ in reference to the H.G. Wells novel, “The Island of Doctor Moreau”.





	Moreaus

“Call me Damien.” The badger said as he sipped his whiskey at the bar. Walter took a sip of his and gagged. This was not very good whiskey.

“You get used to the taste. Or, just drink the vodka. Kills your taste buds so everything tastes good or you don’t taste anything at all. Mixed results.” Damien said as he finished his glass. He checked his watch. It read 10:45 PM. It was an old analog watch, made in 2023. Moreaus didn’t have any of the new stuff. This watch was ancient. Older than Moreaus as a collective.They were stuck with the hand-me downs from human society. Damien found this watch in a lost and found box. He made sure nobody stopped by to pick it up at his job of club security. Despite being average sized, he was extremely strong, and durable. It was the badger DNA. Technically, his great grandfather, being a full badger. Aa to his durability, some jack-ass tried to stab him with a bowie knife and it drew blood but only a small amount and didn’t puncture him. That wallaby was conscious just long enough to regret his decision. He once lifted a car partially off of a man who was pinned outside. He stretched and yawned. Walter, the man he’d just met and apparently a human journalist was pulling up ‘Travesty’, a writing program on the tablet he had. He said he wanted to get first hand accounts of life in the ‘moreauvilles’ and ‘morph-towns’, the technologically behind and poorer, segregated districts from the human cities. Better than the concentration camps his grandfather lived in but no where near as good as many moreaus would prefer. But total equality was something unachievable in his lifetime. Something Damien accepted as a teenager.

Damien pulled out a package of ‘Langley's Cigarettes’ with a picture of an attractive female otter moreau on the front laying on a rock, surrounded by water. He opened the pack and pulled out a cigarette. He placed it in his mouth and pulled out his vintage ‘2055 Kaiser-lighter’. He was given it by his father, who had gotten it from a furry girl who took a fancy to him. No idea where she got it from. He lit the cigarette and took a long drag.

Walter looked over at him as though he’d just committed a murder.

“What are you doing? That's illegal!” Walter exclaimed.

“Lots of things are illegal.” replied Damien, finishing the conversation. Walter looked over to the sphynx cat bartender who looked at Damien tiredly and back to the radio he was listening to. It was playing some old 10’s alternative. He was listening to the oldies station.

Walter tried to hide his disgust at the burning cylinder in Damien's mouth. Walter hated the smell, wispy tar, chemicals now poisoning the air. Nobody smoked in human society. They had long ago cast off the shackles of nicotine addiction and this gross violation of what he considered to be common sense and basic decency bothered him.

“May I begin with the interview?’” Walter said with mild uncertainty.

“Shoot.” Damien replied.

“Alright, first off, how long have you lived here outside the Tulsa metropolis?”

“About all my life. My dad was allocated here when they had the AI’s give us names instead of numbers, and places to live. I grew up in the outskirts, by the open fields. Dad was a hydroponics guy. He grew stuff. Effectively. Had a green thumb. But it wasn’t for me. Never had the patience for something like that. My mama always said I had the patience of a rock.”

Walter looked up from his tablet and gave Damien a bizarre look. “But rocks are supposed to have large amounts of patience since they’re around for so long?”

“Not the way she saw it. To her, it was inanimate, therefore, it couldn’t have patience. So in short, a rock isn’t alive, so it doesn’t have any patience. But that's not the point. She was right. I didn’t and still don’t have the patience to grow things.Club security is way more fun. Someone new every night.”

“Club security? That's what you do?” Walter said, adjusting his glasses. He didn’t look up from his tablet, but typed furiously.

“Yeah. Break up fights, watch the girls and guys to make sure no one oversteps, check the entrance to make sure no one who’s a trouble maker or underage gets in, give the gambling guys protection, help the bartender and some other stuff. Occasional emotional support.” Damien took another drag.

“Sounds like you do a lot. But I’m confused. It sounds like your ‘clubs’ are a mix of a strip-club, a casino, and a rave club.”

“You’d be right to assume that. We do it all here. Most clubs are like that.” He scratched the fur on his snout and then brushed it down.

“Ok…” Walter typed in that sentence as a quote. “Also, Emotional support?”

“Let's say some guy or girl is off in a corner crying or having a breakdown in the bathroom, right? I help them out. Took a few psychiatry courses in community college but lost interest. Too impersonal. But it’s finally helping me out.”

“Anything that stands out?”

“ I don’t feel like touching up on the time I talked a guy down from blowing his brains all over everyone on the dance floor from the second story. That's an… unpleasant memory…”

Walter blinked twice, and typed. “What is it like as…” Walter looked at Damien nervously, scared he’d insult him in some way.

“A Moreau? Or a Badger? Or a single lower middle class man living alone? But maybe you know that last one already.” Damien chuckled and took another drag

Walter blushed. “The first two would be fine.”

“Let me rephrase the question, what is it like as a human?”

Walter was confused by this and was silent.

“Exactly my point. You don’t really think about yourself until you have to describe it to someone whom it is completely alien to. It’s your default setting. To translate me to you is like Korean to Chinese, we’re similar, yeah, and have similar roots, but so different that its difficult to understand. I guess as a Badger, I’m far stronger than you humans overall and I guess I can smell things better? Obviously I have fur and animal qualities. It’s funny, you humans have animal qualities too. From Apes. You just took longer to show up the natural way.” Smoke escaped his nostrils.

“And as a moreau?”

“Inside the city? The only difference is that we’re stuck in the past with hand-me-down stuff so leaving is like stepping into racist tomorrowland. I also noticed how much robotics is a part of you guys's life when I had to update my ID. Like, everything has some kind of AI or Robot with it. Pretty weird.”

“We’re working towards the singularity for a better species. We all work together. My AI is in my partner at my apartment. She is out of my head today because I need to be just me for this trip.” Walter said.

“You keep AI’s in your head?” Damien said with surprise. He puffed smoke.

“Yes, it improves cognition, response, and helps with memory. It also monitors your health so you always know what going on with your body. And mine is a companion.” Walter said nonchalantly.

Damien scoffed. “And the Androids?”

“What about them? They’re like us except made of silicon, titanium and synth-skin. They think differently, too. It’s amazing to hear them speak their thoughts. My android is my AI, or at least its personality. Theres the personal enhancement AI and the companion AI. And Androids appeal to everyone. They can be whoever you want. Some of the Furries actually keep anthropomorphic androids.” Walter said. His stomach dropped when he remembered who he was speaking to.

Damien stomped out his cigarette and then threw it into the incinerator. He lit another and dragged. “What kinds?” He said uncomfortably.

“W-well, the man who lives across from me keeps a renamon…” Walter stuttered.

“What the hell is a renamon?” Damien asked gruffly.

“Around 100 years ago there was a game called ‘digimon’ that featured these creatures born from code in this cyber-universe and there was a foxlike one called Renamon.” Walter pulled up a picture of a yellow fox with two fingers and a thumb with purple cloth on its arms. “Granted, I’m pretty sure he was born in two thousand so he would have been there when this was original.”

Damien went into a coughing fit. “He’s over one hundred years old?”

“Yeah. Our medicine is advanced. We’ve managed to practically reverse aging in humans up to age one hundred and twenty. But last question. What are the worst things you encounter in your day to day life?”

Damien took his cigarette out of his mouth. “Probably the Mafia. They run the whole damn city. Police don’t like coming here so only a few automated robot patrols pass through occasionally. You piss off the Mafia, or on of the factions, you’re a dead man. The second is unorganized criminals. But I really feel bad for the prostitutes. They have it the worst usually, as far as crime and punishment go. Since you humans have made prostitution illegal, you don’t take mercy on the ones here. The Mafia is there only protection and the bosses who aren’t kind of heart absolutely will not give them normal fees. Its always higher protection fees because it’s a dangerous career, unless it's at the club. We keep an eye on those girls to make sure nothing goes awry.”

Walter finished typing and stood up. He tucked his tablet into his bag and faced Damien. “Well thank you Mr. Damien Donovan. I appreciate the interview and this will be going in the article. I bid you adieu.”

Damien turned and stopped Walter before he left the bar. “Go find a hotel. Humans aren’t exactly popular here in the day. It’s worse at night.”

Walter swallowed and ‘goodnight’ as he walked out of the bar. Damien stomped out that cigarette and went back to his whiskey, listening to the old song ‘welcome to the black parade’.

“Hey, K.” Damien said.

“Yeah?” The bartender answered.

“Isn’t this more punk than alternative? And didn’t this come out in 2006?”

“Since when are you an expert on oldies music?” K asked sarcastically.

“Since I learned how to use a search engine. I guess it's something the DJ has forgotten how to do.”

K sighed. “Music is music,and I like this song.”

“Me too.” Damien replied forlornly.

The pair listened in silence. This song was far older than they, but met them both emotionally on a very deep level.

“Take fire to the end we hear the call to carry on… To carry on… When you’re dead and gone believe me, your memory will carry on... “

K and Damien hummed along in the quiet bar.

* * *

  
Damien was dressed in a plain black shirt and some black jeans. This was his attire for work. He strode past the line at the front of the ‘Beating Heart’ club he worked at. The Lion at the entrance was checking identification.

“Hey, Leroy.” Said Damien as he passed.

“Hey, Damien.” Leroy said as he pretended to check the fake ID of an obviously underage rabbit guy. “Leroy must be humoring him.” Damien thought as he passed through the door. He immediately smelled cigarette smoke and alcohol. But they were better brands that bled more class than dinginess. It was Mafia night. Once a month, all of the Mafia factions came together at a club in the Moreau-ville to talk peace, money, and find common ground. They usually chose this one. If you wanted an audience with the mob, this was the night to do it. Tonight, Damien would mostly be a spectator as the mob brought their own guards.

It was practically a diplomatic summit. The only night when they weren’t out to get each other. Everything had to go well. Damien positioned himself by the bar and looked out for any troublemakers. Mafia members were dressed formally, dancing in the ‘beat square’. They weren’t all business all the time. It was this night every month that reminded him that they were people too.

He started identifying the various ‘families’ present. The first he saw were ‘The Crows’. The name was self explanatory, the leaders were primarily crows. Except for the head, who was a Raven. His predecessor was a Crow. He takes the distinction dangerously seriously. They think he keeps the name ironically.His boys were seated in a lounge, sipping scotch and smoking cigars. The Raven, Westfallen, his name was, was speaking to the leader of the next group.

They called themselves ‘The Hapsburgs’ after the old eastern european royal family. Their leader, a wolf named Fritz ‘von Hapsburg’. He was raised in the Morph-town outside Vienna. Nobody but him knew how he ended up here. He had a thick German accent. He was drinking from a bottle of Ottokringer. His Cigarette was resting in an ashtray on a cigarette holder.

The next was a the Isis family, headed by an Asp woman named Nile. She was living it up on the beat square. She had many creative dance moves since she had no legs, but she did, however, have arms. Like every other Moreau. Her confidence in her body was also impressive. If she was any less clothed than her formal black dress, she would have been mistaken for a dancer. Her breasts made a slight bounce after every move. He had no idea whether they were natural, or she had them implanted to feel more womanly. Or maybe it was to assert her gender. A lot of the reptiles get some kind of makeup or mod to assert their genders to other people. She was enchanting to watch.

The last important family were the sidewinders. Led by a coyote named Peter who was currently receiving a lap dance from an antelope girl named michelle. He was considered a frightening individual. On a more personal level than the other bosses. He could smile to your face as he stabbed you in the back, not just figuratively, literally. He was cackling at his own arousal. Michelle was focusing on the dance, rather than how unnerved this made her. But Damien knew Michelle. He could see the subtle differences when she was headstrong and now.

Damien surveyed the dancer area. A siamese cat named Olivia was doing her bit and the men and sexually inclined women were eating it up. But something seemed off in the crowd. He looked closer and there was a polar bear in a hoodie, about 7’8 taking pictures with his phone. That was strictly prohibited. Damien slowly made his way through the crowd and over to the bear. He tapped on his back, since that's what he could reach standing at 5’11 himself.

The bear turned around with a sour expression when he looked down at Damien. His hoodie said ‘FUCK’ on the front of it and he didn't in the slightest seem modest or embarrassed about the massive tent he was pitching.

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to put your phone away. Photos and video are strictly prohibited in the dancing area. If you refuse to put it away, I’m going to have to escort you to the exit.” Damien said assertively.

“I don’t see any harm with it. It’s just a few pictures.” He said in a deep, bass voice.

“Yes and the dancers prefer that their image doesn’t leave the building with them. Put it away.”

The Polar bear got in Damiens’ face. He could smell Alcohol and fish on his breath. “And I bet you’re gonna fucking make me.”

“If you don’t do it yourself, you bet your sorry ass I will.” Damien finished, crossing his arms.

The Polar Bear took a deep breath and said: “Fine. But there's something I want to do first.”

Without warning, he swung his massive paw at Damiens side immensely hard. Damien went flying and bounced off a table and crashed into the wall next to the Crows booth.Everyone moved out of the bears way and guards went close to their bosses. There were a few gasps and ‘ouch’es from the crowd. Damien stood up and shook the dizziness from his head. He bared his teeth and made an angry noise, used by his great grandfather to frighten other predators away. It was instinctual.

“Wrong move motherfucker.” Damien said as he ran towards the bear. The bear roared deafeningly loud and went to meet him. Damien dodged the first swing and drove a knife hand under the bears ribs. He gasped. Damien grabbed his arm and went behind him and pushed his arm up, old school police style. To account for size, he kicked the back of the bears knees to force him down and Damien then pushed him to the ground and got on top of him and pushed his arm in. The bear was howling in pain.

“Are you fucking done?” Damien asked.

“Yes!” The bear screamed.

Damien forced him up and shoved him out of the building and kicked him down onto the sidewalk. Leroy and everyone in line was incredulous.

“And don’t fucking come back!” Damien shouted. He walked back inside.

Damien found the entire place silent, looking at him when he returned. “Hey!” He shouted. “You came here to load off and have fun! Carry on!”

The crowd cheered. Damien went back and seated himself at the bar. He needed a break, even if he wasn’t going to drink. He broke nothing when he was thrown into the wall, but he was shaken up. He felt nauseous. It slowly passed, and just as it did, he was approached by Nile. The boss of the Isis group.

“Hey, tough guy…” Her voice was as smooth as silk with a bit of hiss present. “That was a pretty impressive display back there. What's your name?”

“My name is Damien.” Damien said, leaning back against the counter. He was mildly concerned as to where this could be going.

“I was thinking maybe you could give me a… personal demonstration?” She had a wicked smile on her face, she shifted to show more of her cleavage. Damien was getting an ‘invitation’ from a mob boss. This could go a thousand different ways.He ran it through his head quickly. Most of the situations where he turned her down didn’t go well for him in the short and/or long run. And on a deeper more primal level.... He was interested.

“I’d be happy to accommodate your needs after my shift is over.” Damien said with a slight smirk.

“I look forward to it.” Nile said smoothly.

Westfallen and Fritz were waving him over. He had no idea that taking down a guy who was one and half times bigger than him after getting knocked across the room by him would be so beneficial for him. He was just doing what he was getting paid to do. He approached the raven and wolf. The wolf held his cigarette holder and took a light drag.

“You did good, boy.” Said Fritz. “Very impressive. I’m a man of few words. If you need a bailout or something to do, my door is open.” Fritz handed Damien a card.

“Couldn’t have said it better myself.” The raven said as he passed a card to Damien. A raccoon approached him and told him that Mr. Sidewinder requested his presence. He followed the raccoon. He walked up the flight of stairs and over to the end of the balcony where the Coyote sat, drinking wine.

The first words that came out of his mouth was: “I don’t like you, Badger.”

“Have I done something to offend you?” Damien said, startled.

“Nothing in particular.” He said.

“Then what's wrong?”

“Have you ever read the story ‘the tell tale heart’ by Edgar Allen Poe?” Peter said, looking over at the dancers rather than at Damien.

“No, Sir.” Damien replied.

“The main protagonist kills a man he befriends because he doesn’t like his eye. He chops up the body and hides it in the floorboards. After learning there was nothing wrong with the eye except it was blind, he fesses up to the police after a fit of madness.”

“So, what does that have to do with me?” Damien asked nervously.

“I don’t like the way you walk.” Peter said darkly.

Damien gulped.

“I’m a fair guy. Watch your back.” Peter finished. He waved Damien away. The racoon escorted him away. He’d probably up his protection fees with the other three, or hopefully he wouldn’t have to if this thing with Nile went well.

The rest of his shift was uneventful, all potential trouble makers cleared out when he walked by and everyone else seemed to forget the incident as the night went on. He met Nile outside at around 2 AM and she invited him into her car. He had the mild impression he was being lured into a trap but he suppressed it. She wrapped her tail around his legs to show just who she envisioned was in control. Or was she enticing him to take control? He wasn’t quite sure. These things had never been his forte. She lived in a very large apartment of several rooms. It may be worth noting that most people in urban areas lived in apartments. The age of estates and individual houses had passed in 2064. Repeatedly, she would whisper “I do love your warm blood…” in his ear. For the first 30 minutes it was as though she was draining the heat from his body. She was amused when he wasn't frightened by her biting trick, her fangs couldn't pierce his skin. Damien was positively sure that he would be immune to the venom anyway. The whole night consisted of power reversals. “She might have had anaconda in her blood somewhere.” Damien thought. Apparently, the aforementioned glands were real but she didn't hatch with them. They were grown on her. She said they made her feel more feminine when she was always surrounded by mammals. After awakening and finding he still lied with her, Nile invited him to have a cup of coffee. To which Damien accepted.

“I think I'll have to keep you around, Donovan. You're the first man to stick around and didn't piss himself at my venom play. I think I'd like to get to know you better.”

Damien took a deep drink of his coffee. And replied:

“Yeah, I think I'd like that.”

 

* * *

  


Damien was somewhat of a local celebrity. Many people caught his ‘fight’ with the bear. He wouldn’t call it a fight. He got up from being knocked to the side and used his training to immediately put him down. On the Extranet, he was a celebrity in every sense of the word. He was trending on 10000 different sites. Most of them human, surprisingly. It wasn’t enough for a raise, but to his boss, who never seemed to show any emotion at all, it was enough for ‘a bag of chips and a high five’, which was more than he ever seemed to show to anyone else.

Nile was happy for him. She was actually quite normal when she wasn’t a mob-boss. According to her, she got the position because she was smart and could read people. She also wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty and had ambitions to leave the biggest footprint on the world she could after her passing.

“I don’t want to leave the world as a whisper, a hiss.In this world, we’re disadvantaged. We Moreaus start two rungs lower than our human cousins. There’s very few ways to leave a mark on the world in an environment where you can’t affect anything you can’t physically change.” Was something Nile told Damien. The Mob was something that landed in her lap. The old boss, a Yorkie by the name of Maximilian, founded the whole thing. She was hired to come in and do some tech stuff because she had an uncommon talent in Moreaus; She could work electronics like a human could. He saw value in this. Nile then discovered a plot to remove Maximilian from power and he had the perpetrators thrown out and made Nile his second. But you can’t account for everything. Accidents happen. Turns out when they were renovating the poorer districts of the city to make room for the Moreaus, they forgot some high-grade explosives on a sidewalk. He was the only one killed, 7 others were injured.

Nile knew how dangerous of a power vacuum this was and instead of reserving herself and opting out altogether, she rose to fill the spot. She got the support of the members who supported Maximilian to a fault then silenced all opposition. Now she runs a crime family, if one of the ‘nicer’ ones.

She had a very dominating personality. Which was obvious from the moment Damien met her. But she could be quite gentle, and kind. She was beautiful when she wasn’t terrifying. Damien learned that, surprisingly, they had a lot in common. Such as their mutual love of older music and ‘Electro-Swing’ which wasn’t popular at it's inception but was making strides in the modern world. They enjoyed the same E-books, such as ‘Noir’, a detective mystery(ironic for Nile) and ‘Stellar’ which was an unfinished mega-series where humans went to the stars with the Moreaus and different species colonized different worlds based on their traits. Main protagonists changed every two books since a considerable amount of time passed between books. In the last one, Galactic civilization collapsed, hundreds of thousands of species on millions of worlds. With previews to the next book, 40000 years has passed and they had forgotten about the galactic civilization but used their artifacts to rediscover FTL. They'd probably see all the other ones as aliens. Damien and Nile had a fun conversation discussing that very thought.

He liked her. It wasn’t quite love, yet. Love takes time. It's more like they noticed a compatibility and are trying to cultivate that deep emotional connection. Both of them pride themselves on their ability to leave work ‘at the door’ and work on being a couple at home. Damien found himself spending an increasing amount of time at Nile’s flat over the next few months.

Damien was still disturbed by Peter Sidewinders insinuation that he’d kill him. The man had survived through determination and sheer ruthlessness. But he left the rational thinking to officials he set.

Damien had seen black driverless cars, sleek and fast following him on his way home from work. This disturbed Damien. He’d seen Niles people. These were not her people. He knew who sent them. This unspoken fact disturbed him. He had no idea when they’d pounce. He didn’t know if he could fight his way out. He knew that if they shot him up, he’d be wounded bad but he’d have a good chance at survival. The only really effective way to kill a badger was blunt force trauma to the head, repeatedly. Turn the brain to soup. Damien knew this, so he kept his head out of the way when it came to people with the capacity to bash his head in.

He spoke to Nile about his concerns the next day. She was coiled up up on the couch, watching the holo-screen on the wall, eating bits of teriyaki mutton from a bowl. She was wearing a black T-shirt and just her plastic, polyester cup over her genitals. Being a snake, that was all she needed. The rest of her lower body was filled with certain glands and intestines. Damien sat down on the couch with her. She was watching a news segment on how the Lone Rangers, East Coast Defence Force, and Minute Men were stepping up their resistance efforts. They were terrorist organizations at this point. The war had been over for 26 years and these groups still pretended like the United Nationalist American Empire hadn’t lost yet. They were a danger to civilians and soldiers alike. When cornered, they didn’t surrender. The number of captured from each group was under 5 each. That was because for all but 2 of the ECDF and 1 of the Minutemen, their explosive vests had failed to detonate. The Rangers were by far the most bold. But this wasn’t what Damien wanted to focus on.

“Nile?” Damien asked.

She licked the Teriyaki sauce off of her reptilian lips with her tongue. “Whats up?” She replied.

“You remember Peter Sidewinder?” Damien asked with a hint of fear.

“The guy who makes a point to wound 3 of my people every month just to prove I can’t stop him? Yeah. I know him.” Her tongue flicked out and tasted the air. “You’re scared. What the hell did he do?” She inquired, concerned now. “Is he threatening you?”

“Yeah. He is. Remember the party? Where we met?”

“How could I forget? Go on.”  
“He called me to his presence and told me about some old story by Edgar Allen Poe and said he was going to kill me.”

“Directly?”

“No. It’s what he insinuated. The book was ‘The telltale heart’ if that matters.”

“That son of a bitch. I mean, he is because he’s a canine, but that's not important.” Her unintentional pun helped the mood of the room. “I’ll get you some extra protection but that's the most I can do… Unless…”

“Unless what?” Damien queried, thinking he might already know the answer.

“Unless you come work for me. I can appoint you my personal bodyguard so you’re always close to me, and thus my boys. Plus you’re good at fighting, I’ve seen you.” Something like a smile crossed her lips.”You didn’t think I knew about the pit fights. But it's me who rigs the cash system when we’re running low. And we keep cameras for various reasons.”

Damien made a crooked face. “Yeah. I like to fight. It's better than drugs in the long run. I prefer adrenaline over cocaine anyway. After that first time, you get less energy after every use. I went to rehab. But now, Adrenaline gives me that high and it's always the same, if it doesn’t spike.Which is awesome when that happens. And it’s always a little unfair because of my Badger blood. Once I got the pain tolerance, I’m a hard fight.” Damien finished.

Nile laughed and pulled Damien towards her. “It’s ok, my boy just loves to fight. Nothing wrong with that. I especially liked your fight with Ivan Kuekuatsheu.” She was getting mildly aroused at the memories.

Damien nuzzled her. “Yeah, he’s my rival. Wolverine. He put up one hell of a fight. A close one too, but he got tired for 1 second-”

“And you put him down.” Her tongue flecked out and quickly stroked his lips like an expert painter makes a quick brushstroke. “Well, you can fight. I know you’re committed to me because you’re still here. And this job pays better, if it's slightly more dangerous when on the job. So, Lover, do you want to work for the Mob?” She asked, with something Damien couldn’t identify coming from her voice.

“Out of respect, I’m going to give my two weeks notice to Karl for keeping me, then I’ll be ready.”

Nile smiled and rubbed Damiens head. “Good Boy.”  
...

Two weeks passed, every night Niles men would meet him outside work and walk him to her apartment, he was staying with her now. The cars came for the first week then stopped. Peter wasn’t giving up, but this is what was considered a loss in his world. Her was a very angry Coyote, and his actions showed that. He didn’t just wound the Isis boys he found on his turf, he maimed them or killed them in horrible ways, such as skinning them alive. No other man or woman who worked for him had the stomach to do it, but for Peter, there was a disconnect. The screams were far away, the blood was warmer than the cold he always felt inside his soul. The knife separating the skin from muscle and bone felt like he was shaping some statue, or cutting clay. A beautiful kind. The only redeeming kind of false art. It brought him joy. It wasn’t the pain itself, or the act of killing that brought Peter joy. It was the way it felt. He was always apathetic to everything. Only sex and killing gave him feeling. Feeling was the only drug he was addicted to.

When something stood out in his world of grey apathy. He needed to do something about it. Such as when a hiker sees something shiny sticking out of the ground, they investigate and remove it. This was the way he saw very specific things. Streaks of color on some fur. Eyes that shone. Beautiful teeth. The way someone walks.

He considered himself an admirer of beauty in the world. When he found it, he had to possess it. Not something physical. Statues were stone. Paintings were colors on paper. Gold and Silver were metals. Diamonds and precious gemstones were just that, rocks of color. They were all fake. They were not real to him. He hated them, the fact that they fooled so many people into believing they were beautiful infuriated him. They were the black parts of his grey world. But truly beautiful things, found in people, was real. They shone brilliantly in his world. Things that disturbed this beauty had to be removed, especially if they were part of the same being.

The badger had been on his mind for a month now. He needed him. Needed him to be close. To feel his blood soaked into his fur and on his skin. His breath on his neck. He trembled at the thought. His fur was beautiful. His skin was beautiful. His brilliant blue eyes were beautiful. But his gate… It was ugly. He needed him, but he wouldn’t cripple him. That would make it worse. No, he needed to end the motion, but keep the beauty, so he could have it all for himself. Not tainted by the vile snake. Peter would have him, and fix him, so he’d be perfect, like the other three came so close to being.

…

Damien was going as the face for a catering delivery to a world war 4 veterans memorial. Apparently this was big. They were inviting the Moreaus who served, regardless of nation or faction, the first memorial of it's kind. It had been 3 months since he’d started being Niles bodyguard and second-in-command. They offered to cater as a gesture of goodwill and bought from local restaurants and bakeries.

Damien got out of his driverless car in his formal attire, a black suit and slacks and a fedora. He was getting the mild feeling of being cliche but he didn’t really care at this point. He shook the hand of the organizer of the meet, himself a veteran. He was an Emu and thanked Damien and Nile for their generous contribution. Damien kept staring at his arms and found how similar to his legs, but with more feathers, He thought about how that must have looked by his grandparents creators, but was drawn out of his trance and assured to him that it was no issue. The Isis family did their best to give back to their communities. The Emu thanked him again and Damien gave the order to take it all inside from the truck. Damien got back in his car and told it to take him to the airport, disputed territory, and someone he had business with was currently waiting for a flight out of the city. Damien had already arranged it. He’d leave, but not before Damien was done with him.


End file.
